"My dream is to be the 'Perfect' being to ever exist! I don't care about others and i don't care about eating them!fool!"
The next day,
A caravan from the royal palace arrives at the central town and the messenger announces "As the messenger from the En-noshitha guild, i shall be reading the message by the guild master to all citizens!" He then unrolls a paper and reads "To all adventurers who wish to join the En-noshitha guild, The yearly Entrance exams shall be conducted tomorrow quarter from one; All participants are to enroll their name by two quarter tonight. Also, due to an unnatural event we shall not be holding the entrance ceremony this year. we sincerely apologize to all citizens. That is all!"
The crowd that had formed was disappointed and the angry mob muttered to each other things like "this has never happened before!" "what good is there in the entrance time period than the entrance ceremony?" "now we won't even get to see anything good! other than the dead bodies!"
Amongst this crowd was Ritsume and some other adventurers but none of them cared about the ceremony at all but Ritsume thought to himself "Entrance ceremony? what is that?...well i don't care but what time is this 'two quarter tonight?" He wanted to know about the time but after glancing at the people he was quickly disappointed and walked away but a person came running to him and when Ritsume turned around, the person had tripped and fell unto him.
The person had hit Ritume's head when she fell down and the girl lost consciousness. He slowly pushed her down from his body and when he angrily looked over to see who hit him, he was surprised to see a girl around his age lying down unconscious! he panicked and looked around to find someone who knew her and thankfully an older boy came running to him but for Ritsume's surprise he showed no signs of slowing down and when Ritsume tried to move away, he grabbed him by the collar and yelled
"how dare you try to kidnap my friend by drugging her unconscious you bastard!" This yelling got the attention of the people and they were worried and started to move away from Ritsume.
Ritsume had never experienced anything like this before and panicked until once again his eyes turned emerald! and he grabbed the boy and threw him down and said "you asshole! she was the one who tripped and fell on me! and you just barged in here and start yelling at me? you should learn to use that mush inside you to think about what happened before accusing someone else!"
After this, he changed back to normal and looked at the boy and said "well, now that you have accused me for something i haven't done, i want something out of you!"
The boy was surprised but he replied "umm...well then excuse me, i was wrong but this is no place to talk so lets go to the inn nearby and well we can talk things out there!" Ritsume found it suspicious but followed him and the boy picked the girl up and walked towards the inn Ritsume was living in and on the way another girl that seemed to be the same age as the boy came to him and said "who are you? what do you want?"
She seemed extremely confused but also wary of Ritsume until the boy said to her "ahh... its a long story but Miku tripped and fell on him and i misunderstood him as a kidnapper and-" but was cut of by the girl and said "ok i understand the general situation here. huh you are always like this..." and turns to ritsume and said "i am very sorry about what i said and i also apologize on this idiots behalf!"
Ritsume was a bit flustered hearing this but he quickly took a deep breath and replied "ahh! it's no problem! he just misunderstood that's all!" the boy was angry at Ritsume for this and said to himself "damn this guy! he was so angry at me before but now acts all nice! this guy..."
Three then goes to the inn and sits on a table and the boy drops her on the empty chair and splashes some water on her and wakes her up.
she wakes up surprised and falls out of her chair and looks around and sees three people on a table staring at her and some other old people also staring at her. She was worried at first thinking she was kidnapped but after seeing two familiar faces, she slowly got up and sat back on her chair and asked the boy "who is that person?"
He explains what happened and she was embarrassed at herself for what happened and at her clumsiness but Ritsume said nice things to her and made her feel at ease and after ordering some food, and they introduced themselves to each other.
The boy introduced himself to Ritsume "Hanagaki Mitsuru! nice to meet you and i am sorry for what happened earlier!"
The girl then blushed and introduced herself "Shoei Miku! i am sorry for that, i tripp-" but Ritsume quickly apologized and said "No, its no big deal! actually i am sorry for what i said to your friend! i was being really rude to him!"
The other girl then introduced herself "Takedo itsubiki; i am also sorry! i was being rude!"
And finally Ritsume introduces himself to the others "Ritsume; again, i am sorry for being rude to you all!"
[Authors note: most people reading this are western so i would like to explain something. the character names that are Japanese are introduced with their family names first and first name last as that is how eastern people introduce themself! and western names are introduced normally for example : Tyler walker. and Shoei Miku. her name is Miku and Shoei is the family name or something else. :)]
But the way Ritsume introduced himself Surprised the three as He did not have a family name or surname and because of this, Miku asked him "um... i may seem rude asking this but do you only have that name? we all introduced with our family name but you didn't..."
Ritsume laughed slightly and replied "Something happened in my family when i was a child and after that incident i have never used that name. i threw it away."
Hearing this, Miku quickly stood up from her chair and apologized to Ritsume for what she said "I AM SORRY! i shouldn't have said that! i didn't know about your family and..."
Both Mitsuru and Itsubiki also stood up and apologized to Ritsume but he happily replied "i don't mind it...! i don't care about that at all, it was a long time ago so it's ok! you don't have to apologize!"
The three than sat down and Mitsuru asked Ritsume about what he wanted from him. Ritsume smiled and said "i want information! i am new here so i don't know much about this place and i am going to become an adventurer so i want to know where i should go to enroll for the Entrance exam."
Mitsuru seemed happy about Ritsume's request and said "What a coincidence! the three of us are also enrolling and we are one person short so this is great!'
"One person short? so you can't be alone? ahh! my dream is already crushed!'
Miku was amused by Ritsume and said "No, you just need to be in a group of four to enroll and participate in the Entrance exam! You can be alone after that once you've joined the guild!"
Hearing this, Ritsume's spirit was restored and he happily agreed to joining them but that's when a problem arose! Mitsuru explained to the other three about the time that was announced "My grandfather used to work with weird times like this so i know what those times are! and there is a problem! we have to enroll before 9pm tonight! and we only have 5 hours! and we don't have much to any clue so we have to find this place fast!"
Itsubiki quickly got a clue and told the rest "you see, my father used to be an adventurer and he said 'The entrance exams are always conducted in one place every year and once it's over, the guild alters our memory and we forget were it is... that is the tradition but there is one clue given to us to pass down to the next generation. Find the boat of flames in the terrifying shallows."
The other three were intrigued by this and Miku quickly thought of something! "hey, i think i have a small idea as to what it is!
"What is it?" Mitsuru asked.
"The boat of flames probably refers to the Luminus magic infused boats that are sent to the sewers to light up the tunnels so that if someone loses their way or their light is gone, they can walk along with these boats and find a way up! some old people do call them flaming boats!'
The three was impressed by Miku but then Ritsume brought up a subject that was another problem! "i may be new in this city but i am sure that there are a lot of ways in the sewers and its probably really long too! so we need to pinpoint the area..."
Mitsuru said "He does have a point!..."
Miku then thought of something and said "hey, doesn't the clue also have 'the terrifying shallows'? and if we take it that this is somewhere in the sewers, then it has to be somewhere that has monsters too! and there is only two places that monsters dwell in the sewers! and one of that is near the guild too! it's entrance is always open because it is near the guild too!"
"Nice find!" Mitsuru happily exclaimed.
But then Itsubiki said "But doesn't that mean we have to fight monsters too?"
And this is when Ritsume said with a smile "we don't have to try so hard like the other idiots! we can just walk outside the sewers and because the entrance is always open, we can just enter from there!'
The others were happy about this and also jealous because they never thought about it! They the pay for the food and because they still had about 4 hours left, they slowly walked there chatting on the way and in 40 minutes they reached there to see a middle aged man in rags with a book on hand.
Miku did not notice him and walked towards the entrance and the man asked her "Are you here for the entrance exam?" Hearing this, she turned around and seeing him, she screamed "Ghost! ahhhh!"
The man was angry and shouted 'Why does everyone think of me as a ghost? they aren't real! grow up kid! you're annoying!"
The other three then run over to her and while Mitsuru and Itsubiki calmed Miku down, Ritsume went to the man and said "the four of us are here to enroll in the entrance exams!"
The man replies with a dull look and expression " ok; you are participents 209 - 212. oh and i am Ron di giovanni. Sector commander of the En-noshitha guild!."
All four of them smirk and say "weird name!"
The sector commander was not happy at this but continued and said " to pass the entrance exam, you must survive 8 hours in another dimension in pairs of two. you blonde and that loli, you two are together and you kid and that girl is together."
"Itsubiki and mitsuru and me and Miku huh? score!" Ritsume thought in his mind.
The sector commander then chants "Obscurent entibus tenebrae et lux nos vertat rectam,ianuam mundo nivis et pruinae aperiat. ferae et homines rampage! floir! (latin for: let darkness befriend the beings and let light turn us the right way, open up the portal to the world of snow and frost. let the beasts and beings rampage! Floir!)
To be continued-